


I Need A Hero

by imaginary_golux



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Fluff, Multi, Rescue Missions
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-28
Updated: 2018-05-28
Packaged: 2019-05-14 23:41:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,903
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14779493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/imaginary_golux/pseuds/imaginary_golux
Summary: Every so often, even the most competent person needs a rescue.Beta by my darling Best Beloved, Turn_of_the_Sonic_Screw.





	I Need A Hero

_I’m Holding Out For A Hero Til The Morning Light_

Rey chips determinedly at the mortar holding the shackle to the wall. The manacle around her wrist blocks her from the Force, which is its own special kind of torment, and her captors took her ‘saber while she was unconscious, as well as both of her holdout knives and her staff. Her head still aches, the knot on it throbbing in time with her pulse, and she’s pretty damn sure her captors have already sent a message to the First Order. She can’t even really blame her captors for turning her in: Kylo Ren put a three-million-credit bounty on her head. Back when Rey was a scavenger, she would have done - she doesn’t even _know_ what she would have done for three million credits. Maybe she wouldn’t have sold a stranger to the First Order, but she can’t be _sure_ of that. So no, she can’t blame her captors.

She’s just not particularly _happy_ about their choice, either.

But if she can just get this shackle out of the wall, she’ll have a _weapon_ \- not as good as her ‘saber or her staff, but a length of heavy chain is nothing to sneeze at, either - and with a weapon in her hands, she has a chance to escape, even if it’s a slim one.

The lockpicks she keeps in her shoe aren’t meant for digging crumbling mortar out of stone walls - and, unfortunately, do no good at _all_ against a manacle that has been _welded_ shut, Force take it - but they’re what Rey has available, and she’s used to making do, to using the tools on hand to do what must be done.

There’s a window high on one wall - too small for her to slip through, even assuming she manages to get the shackle loose - and she’s been tracking the passage of time as best she could by the sliver of sky visible through it. The moon of this world, an enormous blue-green thing like a small world in itself, has set, and faint grey light announces the rising sun. Rey redoubles her efforts, swearing under her breath in Huttese.

Faintly, through the window, she hears blaster fire.

Rey grins, fierce and furious, and yanks hard on the shackle; the crumbling mortar, weakened to uselessness by her picks, finally lets go, and she’s standing there with a length of chain dangling from one hand, the shackle dangling from the other end. The blaster fire outside gets louder, and Rey steps to the side of the door, chain ready in both hands, waiting.

The door slams open, and Rey leaps. Her captor, expecting a half-unconscious girl chained to the wall, is briefly but badly startled by the movement, and then the shackle cracks into his temple, and he falls like a stone. Rey whirls to face the door again, crouched and ready.

There _is_ a figure framed in the open doorway, blaster easy in his grip. Finn grins at her, holding out his open hand. “C’mon, we’ve got a path open to the ships, and Chewie got your gear,” he says, and Rey takes his hand and lets him pull her into a run, heading down the stone corridor to freedom.

“I knew you’d come for me,” she tells him, and Finn smiles over his shoulder at her.

“Always,” he promises, and even without the Force, Rey can hear the truth.

_***_

_Isn’t There A White Knight Upon a Fiery Steed?_

Finn ducks back behind an outcropping as the Stormtroopers fire again. “Kriff,” he says tightly, and his second-in-command nods grimly.

“They must’ve had this planned for a _while_ ,” she says. “Think they’re after us specifically, sir?”

“I suspect they’re after _me_ specifically,” Finn says. “And given how well they pulled off this ambush, we’ve got a mole on our side somewhere. If we make it back, remind me to tell the General _personally_. There’s not _that_ many people who knew we were gonna be here.”

“Yes, sir,” Kaydel says, and peers around the rock. “Kriff, there’s a lot of them.”

Finn nods, and slides back into the little divot in the rock where the rest of his unit is waiting. Cobel is gritting his teeth as Tabala slathers bacta on his blaster burn. Thank the Force, Finn spotted the ambush _just_ before they sprung it, and managed to get them all into cover without any more serious wounds than Cobel’s.

That’s not going to last, though. There are too many Stormtroopers - the blasters Finn’s squad carry will run dry before the First Order runs out of troops to throw at them.

“Sharp,” he says slowly, “how’s our escape route looking?”

“Like hell, sir,” Sharp says grimly. “Bucketheads all over it.”

Finn grimaces. He’s not _entirely_ sure why the officers on the other side haven’t just sent the Stormtroopers forward in a wave - it would be an effective tactic, after all, especially if you don’t care about casualty counts, which First Order officers don’t - but he has a nasty suspicion that’s growing with every minute his squad _isn’t_ overwhelmed.

“I think,” he says quietly, “they want me alive. Which means I can draw them off you.” He scans their surroundings carefully. “‘Troopers do badly on uneven terrain,” he continues, over Kaydel’s half-voiced protest. “Go up and over - you might have to carry Cobel - if you can get to the other side of this hill and I’m going _towards_ them you’ve got a decent chance of making it to the extraction point.”

“We’re not going to let you just give yourself up,” Kaydel says furiously.

“Better one man than a whole squad,” Finn says firmly. “That’s an _order_ , Connix. Get Cobel up - we don’t have much more time.”

And then - miracle of miracles - his comm crackles. “Rogue Leader, come in,” Poe’s unmistakable voice says through the static. “Finn, c’mon, you still alive down there?”

“Poe,” Finn says, voice cracking a little with relief, and then gets control of himself. “Black Leader, we’re still alive, and have taken shelter on the north side of the hill, over.”

“Got it,” Poe says briskly. “Keep your heads down, folks!” And then there’s the whistling whine of an X-Wing coming down through atmosphere _way_ too fast, and Black Squadron goes flashing overhead, turbolasers leaving enormous gashes in the neat ranks of the Stormtroopers.

Finn whoops as Poe wheels around for another pass. Kaydel laughs aloud. As one person, his squad gathers their gear and heads for the extraction point, sniping the few remaining Stormtroopers who bother to pay attention to them as they go. Black One swoops overhead, the rest of the squadron hard on Poe’s tail, and Finn grins up at the sky and murmurs to himself, “That’s one _hell_ of a pilot.”

_***_

_I'm Holding Out For A Hero Til The End Of The Night_

Poe comes to slowly, blinking muzzily at the spinning stars above him. BB-8 is beeping frantically - something is wrong, BB doesn’t get that shrill unless there’s a _real_ problem - but it takes a few minutes for Poe to claw enough coherency together to realize - oh. He’s crashed. That last TIE fighter must have hit something important. And now here he is on…

“Where?” he croaks, and BB-8 chirps a very worried answer. An asteroid, somewhere well off any well-traveled lane. Poe blinks his eyes clear - they keep unfocusing, it’s very annoying - and manages to sit up properly, ignoring the way his ribs scream. Time to worry about that _later_.

The little ship is a _wreck_. It’s frankly a wonder enough of the cockpit survived to keep the life support systems running, and - Poe taps a button and grimaces at the readout - they’re going to last another five, maybe six hours at the outside. Engines are gone. Comms are gone. And this was a solo scouting mission; Poe’s not expected back for another ten hours at least, and even if someone _does_ come looking for him, this sector isn’t precisely _small_ , and he’s nowhere near the normal transit lanes. The chances of anyone finding him, here on this tiny asteroid in the middle of nowhere, much less doing so soon enough to find him _alive_ , are...just about nil, actually.

“Well,” Poe croaks through a dry throat, “always figured this war’d kill me. Wish I’d drawn a more _heroic_ card, though. This is just a depressing way to go.”

BB-8 whistle-beeps dismay and stark horror. Poe wants to reach out and pat his old friend reassuringly, but the straps holding him into his seat are too tight, and Poe’s fingers too clumsy to reach the catches. Also it’s very cold in here. That’s...probably a bad sign, come to think of it, given that the little readout on the dash claims it’s a perfectly liveable seventy. Liveable, hah. That’s a good one.

“They’ll find you, buddy,” he tells BB-8, trying to sound as sincere as possible. They’ll come looking, anyway, he knows, and maybe they _will_ find the little droid, somehow. “You be good for Rey an’ Finn, yeah? Bes’ little droid there ever was, that’s my BB -” Talking hurts, it hurts a _lot_ , but words are all Poe can give his friend now, so he keeps babbling, a stream of praise and reminiscences, all the things he wishes he had time to say to his Da and his squadron and his General and - most especially - his dear ones, his warm-hearted Finn and bright-burning Rey, the hope of the galaxy made flesh and blood.

The pain of talking keeps him awake, at least, and Poe watches the life-support readout tick steadily downward and feels his own strength fading. One of those broken ribs must have hit something important; this feels like a lot more than just a concussion and maybe a broken leg. Maybe, he thinks vaguely, it will be his mother come to lead him into the darkness when the time comes. It will be good to see her again.

But it isn’t Shara who appears beside the asteroid, falling out of hyperspace _far_ too close for safety. Poe stops babbling, staring through the cracked viewscreen in disbelief at the kriffing _Millennium Falcon_ , and then, to his mild embarrassment, his involuntary start of surprise jars his ribs so badly that he blacks out.

He wakes up in a bunk on the _Falcon_ , with Rey bent over him, the Force pouring into him from her wide-spread hands. She looks like a young goddess - but then, she always does. “How?” Poe croaks. Rey opens her eyes and glares at him.

“If you think Finn and I didn’t _both_ know the instant you got yourself almost _killed_ , you’re stupider than you act,” she says. “You’ve got to stop almost dying, Poe.”

“Sorry,” Poe says sheepishly. “I don’t do it on _purpose_ , you know.”

“Hmph,” Rey says, and puts a glowing hand on his shoulder. “We can’t _lose_ you.”

“I will never leave you willingly,” Poe says, and Rey nods. It’s the only promise Poe can make in wartime, so it will have to be enough. He swallows hard against the worry he sees in her eyes, and musters his best cocky grin. “Besides, you and Finn have this habit of saving my ass; what have I got to worry about, with heroes like you around?”

Rey sighs at him as dramatically as she can. "Don't be an _idiot_ ," she says almost gently. "You're our hero, too."

**Author's Note:**

> I got the song stuck in my head, and, well...
> 
> I'm imaginarygolux on tumblr.


End file.
